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Which team is ahead in this Test? Is Nathan Lyon the most underrated player in Test cricket?

These questions were posed by an eventful day’s play which saw Australia complete a remarkable fightback to dismiss England for 179 and finish the day needing just 201 runs for victory with 10 wickets in hand.

Is Lyon the most underrated player in Test cricket?
During the last Ashes in England, the home team believed the gulf in talent between tweakers Graeme Swann and Nathan Lyon was so distinct that they had dry pitches prepared to exploit it.

Little more than five months on and Swann has been forced into retirement while Lyon has played a massive role in Australia regaining the Ashes.

The Aussie off spinner, who snared his 100th Test wicket today, is lambasted by scores of local and foreign fans every time he delivers a poor spell.

Frequently described as an ‘average’ bowler, he is constantly underestimated.

Yet he continues to embarrass his critics.

In the final Test of Australia’s disastrous tour of India in March, Lyon displayed a subtly remodelled action and a change in his stock angle to around the wicket.

At Delhi in that match, Lyon snared a career-high nine wickets, dislodging Virat Kohli and Sachin Tendulkar in both digs.

Including that Test, his last eight matches have seen him return the brilliant figures of 34 wickets at 26.

Most importantly, he is developing a habit of making breakthroughs at pivotal moments for Australia.

In the series opener at Brisbane, Lyon dismissed Ian Bell and Matt Prior off successive deliveries to break the back of England’s first innings.

Then on the last day of that Test, as Alastair Cook threatened to bat his side to a draw, Lyon procured a loose shot from the English skipper to end his 195-minute vigil and kill off England’s hopes of avoiding defeat.

At the WACA, Lyon again prompted the key dismissal, defeating Cook who was well set on 72 to trigger another English batting slide in their first innings.

He helped seal the 3-0 series win in Perth by removing both Kevin Pietersen and Ben Stokes as they threatened to make a game of it in the fourth innings.

Today, however, was his crowning achievement.

He dismissed England’s three most in-form batsmen – Kevin Pietersen, Ian Bell and Stokes – amid his first five-for on home soil.

He defeated each player in the flight, drawing loose strokes which ended in the mitts of fielders.

Lyon’s passion for cricket bleeds through every time he steps on to a Test ground.

His patent determination to hone his skills has been manifested not just in his increasingly potent bowling but also in his vastly improved displays in the field and with the blade.

When he debuted for Australia in Sri Lanka just over two years ago he was a genuine batting bunny.

That was no surprise given Lyon had played only five first-class games to that point so he had little exposure to top-level bowling.

His assured defence, combined with a blossoming range of strokes, has seen him average 24 with the bat in his past 10 Tests.

He has also become a reliable fieldsman after appearing sloppy during the infancy of his Test career.

Now, I ask you Roarers, where does Lyon sit among the most underrated Test cricketers?

Which team is ahead in this Test?
The match swung violently in Australia’s favour in a fast-paced final session today.

But it cannot be overlooked that, since a drop-in pitch was introduced in 1996, the largest successful run chase at the MCG has been 183 by South Africa in 2008.

Australia still require 201 runs to win and remain a skittish batting side.

Should England manage to take two or more wickets in the first session tomorrow panic could well set in for Australia.

Their Ashes adversaries may have stolen the crown as the kings of the collapse this summer.

But Australia remain capable of committing cricketing hari kari as we saw in the first innings here.

Cavalier opener David Warner is the lynchpin for Australia.

While he is at the crease England will be on the defence.

If he survives to lunch I think Australia will win.

The key for England will be to conquer Warner swiftly and then put the squeeze on Australia’s batsman as they did so successfully in the first dig.

As it stands I would place Australia as tepid favourites to triumph.

Percentage wise it is about 60 percent Australia, 40 percent England with no chance of a draw.

Ronan O'Connell has been a journalist for more than a decade, including 9 years at daily papers in WA. He now traverses the world as a travel photojournalist. Check out his work and follow him on Twitter @ronanoco

The Crowd Says (116) | Page 1 of Comments

Thanks Ronan following from Vietnam catching the odd ball here and there. Great to have the wrap up of each day. Agree Lyon is very underrated – he is now an accomplished test cricketer. From along way away it seems that 10th wicket partnership this morning was important (kudos to Lyon again) to get momentum back to Australia. With 38 degrees today the pitch should play a bit quicker tomorrow so I’ll back the Aussies.

How was Laxman underrated Johnno? And I must disagree with you on Tim May. Lyon will continue to prove how rubbish May was. Without Warne at the other end he would barely have got a wicket. Tuffers was an offie that was underrated

5/9 at the Adelaide Oval 1992/93, with a young Warne at the other end, Warne barely bowled in that innings in Adelaide, in that massive world championship like Test match vs the windies, wow Laney5times May must be rubbish with figures like that.

75 wickets at well over 30 and a couple of flash in the pan Michelles. Averaged 3 wickets a test when the Australian pitches were built to turn on the east coast in particular to benefit one SK Warne. One innings doesn’t make a bowler Johnno. If that was the case Michael Clarke and Jason Krejza would be vying for the title of the best off spinner we have ever produced.

Agree that Nathan Lyon has been underrated and I have been guilty myself. My question is what to do about George Bailey? I am not convinced he is test material and I think a high performing shield player needs to be brought in as preparation for South Africa
Thoughts?

Wouldn’t take Doolan to SA on the back of a seriously average summer and a FC average of 37. Not much room for vast improvement on that at the age of 38.
Would much rather take any of Hughes, Wade (specialist bat), Ben Dunk or even Joe Burns.
Particularly Hughes. Australian cricket has been seriously unkind to Phil Hughes. Rescued us at Trent Bridge and dropped 2 Tests later, shuffled around the order constantly, expected to succeed with his teammates falling around him and the squad in a state of disunity..
Had he batted in this series he’d have had a very good summer, Phil Hughes.

Wonderful call on Ben Dunk. He hit a couple of sixes last night so let’s overlook the fact he can’t make his Shield side. Get that man on a plane to Durban.

I don’t know you aside from this comment Nathan so I’m gonna assume you’re a smart guy and this is out of character.

December 28th 2013 @ 9:52pm Train Without A Station
said
| December 28th 2013 @ 9:52pm | Report comment

So Johnno you think we should dump one of the best 6 (Watson) FC batsmen in aus for Doolan who is not even in the top 10. And then what when like 95% of all other players, his test performances are below his FC ones and you have dropped an all rounder with the 3rd best test batting average in the team who also has proven to take key wickets, for a bloke that ends up averaging a tick over 30?

It is a fine balance when it comes to Watto’s place. Australia’s quicks have driven their success this summer and his role amid that is underappreciated.

When the batsman have got on top Clarke has often brought on Watto who has a remarkable ability to bowl maidens. That frugality has then repeatedly led to reckless strokes which broke key partnerships.

That about sums it up. Watson polarises people but really, when he’s fit for batting and bowling he’s an automatic selection. He’s a very capable bowler and he could be selected on his batting alone (although he’d lose that ‘automatic selection’ rating if he couldn’t bowl).

I think it’s a testiment to how hard we play the game that we’ve been on the wrong end of so many losses – you’ll note how many of those involved out champion team of 95-05 and no one could say they didn’t have talent/skill etc. You gotta be in it to loss it sometimes!

What these stats show is that Australia has consistently been a strong team (remember you have to have played well to set up a big chase), whilst the West Indies had a period of success, but have otherwise been poor (can’t even set up big run chases to lose) and South Africa, though they’ve given us to memorable defeats, come across as chokers (and are on the wrong side of the ledger against us with us having two (2) wins over them on that list).